


Bridling

by badgirlcarly



Category: Thunderheart (1992)
Genre: Catharsis, M/M, Over the Knee, Spanking, Therapeutic spanking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-01
Updated: 2013-09-01
Packaged: 2020-12-17 07:54:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,226
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21050921
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/badgirlcarly/pseuds/badgirlcarly
Summary: Like all things, Ray needs to be tempered, and Walter is happy to be that gentling hand.Even when it happens not to be so gentle.





	Bridling

For all his fancy FBI training, all the quiet hours on stakeouts and learning how to sit through tortures of other kinds, Ray is high-strung as an unbroken mustang. It’s something only Walter sees; most people see the federal issue suit and the expensive sunglasses, the set of that fine jaw, and think Ray is a serious man, but when they’re alone together and Ray can drop the act, he’s nervy and young and still raw and wild. And mostly, that’s a good thing, something Walter loves about him, something he craves like the sweet tanginess of his ma’s chokecherry pie. But like all things, Ray needs to be tempered, and Walter is happy to be that gentling hand.

Even when it happens not to be so gentle.

Day three snowbound, and Ray was getting nervier by the minute. His oral tic was in full swing, his jaw working like a horse gnawing the bit. He’d rearranged the living room twice, and done any chores needed doing, and even tried to teach Jimmy to sit. None of it was enough; he had too much unbridled energy to sit still, and he didn’t, pacing about the house, going from window to window like one view would magically show springtime.

“Maybe we could play a board game,” Walter offered, relaxed up against the doorframe and watching Ray pace from window to window.

“We already tried that,” Ray said absently. 

He was right; he hadn’t managed to sit through more than fifteen minutes of Monopoly, the way he couldn’t watch television when he was this high strung. Not that they were getting any reception, not with the snow like it was. 

“Sex?” Walter said.

“I don’t want to.”

Walter watched Ray running a track through the shine of the hardwood, and an idea floated, crystalline and perfect, in his mind.

“Spanking?” he asked.

Ray stopped pacing. Some color came to his cheeks, and he ground his back molars together, hard.

“You serious?” he said.

“As a heart attack,” Walter said, and crossed the floor to meet him, his boots soft on the polished oak. 

Ray dropped his eyes. “Okay.”

Walter nodded, and hitched up his britches, thumbs in the belt loops. “Well, all right. You come on into the bedroom, now, and we’ll get you fixed.”

Ray hesitated, so Walter went first. He could hear Ray shuffling behind him, his normally sneaky silent footsteps clearly audible.

Once in the bedroom, Walter went through drawers and closets and collected an assortment. He laid out his tools on the dresser: a belt, the heavy antique hairbrush that had been his grandmother’s, the strop he used to sharpen his razor, one of Ray’s fancy running shoes. 

“Pick,” he said, and stepped back.

Ray took his time studying the objects laid out on the dresser. Walter could see his jaw working, his legs shaking.

“The brush, I guess,” Ray said finally.

Walter nodded. He moved past Ray—planted solidly as a granite statue—to collect the brush. Then he went and sat down on the bed, the brush in one hand, legs slightly spread.

“Come on now, if you’re coming.”

Ray’s legs were shaking bad, but he came. He stood before Walter, looked down at the waiting lap, at the harsh, hard shine of the brush in the lamplight. Ray’s legs were shaking, but his hands were steady, and he undid his britches and then he took down his shorts, and Walter helped position him as he lay himself over Walter’s knee.

Ray was breathing hard already, and Walter set the brush down and ran his fingers through Ray’s short-cropped, puppy-soft hair, down his nape, and then rubbed his back the way he liked, like rubbing down a nervous horse. Slowly, Ray’s breathing slowed, and Walter could feel him relax over his knee, his legs and shoulders sagging.

“There’s’a boy,” Walter said. “There’s my good boy.” He paused. “We don’t have to do this, you know.”

“No,” Ray said. “I want to. It’ll help.”

“All right, then,” Walter said. “Rules, though. Once we start, we ain’t stopping. Understand?”

“Yes.”

“And it’s gonna hurt; I ain’t gonna give you no gentle love taps or nothin’.”

“I know.”

“So you’re all in.”

“All in.”

“All right, then,” Walter said, and he rubbed his rough palm over Ray’s smooth backside, trying not to get too distracted by the dimples right above. Damn, but he looked good lying across a lap, ass up and ready to be spanked.

Walter let his hand linger fondly over the curve of Ray’s ass for a moment, then raised his hand up and brought it down, hard. Ray jerked a little, and the breath was knocked out of him, one harsh exhalation. Walter smacked him again, and this time Ray was ready, his flesh tense, his hands balled into fists gripping the denim of Walter’s jeans. Walter started up a good tempo, listening to the harsh thunderclap of flesh striking flesh, and then Ray’s pant after. He watched Ray’s backside start to turn rosy, watched the small muscles in his back contract and relax, contract and relax. 

Walter picked up the brush. It was within Ray’s eyesight, but he didn’t fight or complain, just went a little rigid as Walter rubbed the smooth back of the heavy brush over Ray’s sore backside.

“Just do it,” Ray said—a slight break in timbre, and Walter grabbed the hair at Ray’s nape and held tight for a minute.

“Hush,” Walter said. “You ain’t in charge here. You gave that up.”

Ray panted, and for a moment, Walter expected a fight, but then Ray relaxed. Walter let go of his hair, and he set that hand at the small of Ray’s back, between the dimples, to hold him in place. He gripped the hairbrush hard with his other hand, raised it up, and brought it down on Ray’s red backside with an echoing _crack!_ Ray jerked in his lap, and cried out, but he kept his position, not even struggling under Walter’s hand holding him down. Walter brought the brush up, and then he brought it down, again and again and again. Soon Ray was howling, his body drawing into itself like a pill bug, his hands grabbing desperately at Walter’s legs, holding on like a lifeline. Walter was unmerciful, delivering hard smacks to Ray’s backside and upper thighs, until every inch of that lovely flesh was a deep, pretty red. 

Ray was quiet, which Walter knew meant he was crying. Walter set the brush down.

“Think that’s enough, don’t you?”

Ray nodded. Walter let him stay over his lap, teasing the hair at the nape of his neck and rubbing his shoulders like he liked, until Ray settled. Then Walter gathered him up, still sniffling, into his arms.

“Feeling better?” he asked.

Ray exhaled, one long breath. He rubbed at his damp eyes with his knuckles. But his jaw was still; his whole body was still, and Walter knew without receiving an answer that he was.

Walter gave him a kiss. “Still opposed to sex?” he asked, pulling Ray close against him.

Ray wet his lips, flinched briefly at the salt collecting on his tongue. “Can I be on top?” he asked, pale eyes flickering back briefly to his abused backside.

Walter pulled him down to the mattress. “We’ll see, _kola_. We’ll see.”  



End file.
